Look After You
by Mellaithwen
Summary: It's up to Sam to take care of his brother
1. Part One

**Look After You**

**By Mellaithwen**

**Rating: T**

**Genre: Angst/General**

**Disclaimer: Nadaaaaa**

**Summary: It's up to Sam to take care of his brother.**

**Edit: Originally completed 5-22-06, second (and final) part added 10-21-07**

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If I don't say this now, I will surely break.

Sixty-three hours and forty minutes. That's how long it took for the fever to break. Almost three days of sitting by his brother's side with an ice cold washcloth, listening to the mutterings of one too out of it to notice his own honesty. It amazed Sam how easily Dean relayed information when his body was too busy trying to fight infection, fight viruses or cope with blood loss.

It was in those moments; Sam could know everything in the space of an hour. Find out his brother's favourite colour, favourite animal, favourite childhood memory, true feelings regarding the hunt, their father, anyone and everyone they had ever met. The demon itself even. Sam had fought back the laugh to see that even now, ill as he was, Dean could still muster a string of curses when it came to the bastard who had destroyed his childhood.

And that wasn't Sam's own interpretation from a boy school in Stanford, and forced to listen to reason, and his inner psychiatrist. Oh no, Dean was the one who had complained. Two days in, already rambling, making no sense half the time, but giving Sam the distinct impression that his brother was melancholy. So sad, and he didn't mean it in the dork-way. Or the pathetic way, but in the melancholy way. Where each sad sentence, slurred and barely audible made his heart constrict, and a lump formed in his throat while Dean's voice went off on many tangents, all of which ending with a bittersweet silence, Sam could neither stomach, or be rid of.

An ill-Dean was an open book, pages ruffled but relatively untouched. Delicate paper covered in sensitive scripture, cautious calligraphy that span for pages and pages. Chapters of their lives, sometimes messy, hurried, but mostly readable. And mostly audible when Dean dare speak them aloud. Reading like he used to when Sam was younger, and he couldn't get to sleep no matter how dark the room was, or how quiet the house became.

"_An insomniac to the end, my little brother."_

A dying Dean, was more closed, book that is, than ever, but unaware Dean, while ill, while burning with fever, body betraying his innermost secrets, Sam found it all to be a bit much, and he berated his own selfishness. For so long he had urged his brother to speak, but the defence mechanisms gave no leeway, and with a deep hatred for chick flick moments, hugging, or bearing all to Dr Phil, Sam was left in the dark for too long.

But now if ever they opened, Dean's eyes shone, glazed, pupils dilated, lips cracked, but still muttering about his breaking heart, the pieces cast aside, and hidden until the glue could be found.

It was a defence mechanism to never appear weak that had gotten them there, Sam by Dean's bed, checking his pulse, breathing, watching his chest rise and fall, and waiting for him to rouse himself enough to take more medicine.

It was a defence mechanism, or rather, more of a defence, to do as he was told, and suck it up, soldier. It was a defence mechanism, that made Dean ignore the symptoms, or just ignore everything.

Aches and pains were no stranger to Dean Winchester, but Sam had seen him wincing and swallowing the pills that didn't seem to work. Headaches were more Sam's thing, but again, Dean was no stranger to them, and thus, took a little more than the recommended dose. No big deal. The coughing turned to hacking before Sam almost exploded in his brother's face, hating the reminder of almost losing Dean as he rubbed his chest, large hands straying over his heart, shoulders popping back, as he tried to alleviate the pressure and discomfort.

Dean had continued his quest for stupidity and hiding his hurt, until finally that first morning as the fever began to set in slowly, he had collapsed. Sam had seen his brother fall too many times to count, and almost ninety-percent of the time, he got back up. He might fall later on, and his father would carry him back to the motel room, his son's head resting beneath his neck, body bent, and almost broken laid out on the rank sheets as a young Sam waited in the corner, wringing his hands, and panicking to no end.

Dean always tried to get up, at some point. But this time, he stayed down. Stayed still, spread eagle on the tarmac outside of the motel room door, something Sam counted himself lucky for, as his brother's muscle was a bitch to carry long distance. A bitch to carry full stop. Not that he was any better. He could remember so many instances where as a gangly teen, prone to attacks for some reason, Dean had been forced to carry his brother to safety, grumbling all the way while the shots resounded in the distance as their father killed the beast, or exorcised the demon, salted the spirit...

But that was extreme fatigue for you. Seldom does it let you get up.

Sam had to keep a close tab on it, the virus; the influenza. It could lead to pneumonia, respiratory failure, and could turn life threatening in the space of a minute, a minute, too short for any EMT's to get to them. But a hospital visit too soon would drain their dwindling money supply and ignite an unwanted fury Dean. He did hate the places after all. Which left the motel as the only option. Curtains closed should Dean wake up suddenly, and Sam knew from experience that the light from the summer sun would not be appreciated in the slightest. His own bed was still perfectly unruffled and not slept in. He had _stayed_ by his brother's side, falling asleep as his head rested on his forearms by the side of the bed, and he would do so until Dean himself could wake up and complain about the close vicinity his brother had occupied.

But Dean kept quiet, and in silence, Sam worried.

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	2. Part Two

**Originally completed:**** 05-22-06**

**A/N:: I had always intended this to be a oneshot. Not even, it was part of a 15minuteficlets challenge on livejournal, where you get a prompt and write for 15minutes and part 1 was what came out. **

**Then as part of a timestamp meme on livejournal (someone picks a fic of yours and asks for more set before or after the story ends e.t.c.) I got prompted by legoline to do a little more for this. **

**So for those of you who really wanted a sequel of sorts; here it is :)**

* * *

**Be The One I'll Always Know**

_**When I'm losing my control, the city spins around  
You're the only one who knows, you slow it down…**_

120 hours and probably around twenty minutes. That's how long. Give or take the endless seconds where Sam lost time making sure his older brother was still breathing...he wonders sometimes if they were hours.

That's how long. Five days of worrying, wringing his hands and fists. That's how long.

Five days of hell and back before Dean decides to wake up. Eyes roaming back and forth beneath the lids before fluttering open and fixing a confused but far less glazed stare on his brother. The third time he'd _opened_ his eyes but the first time he'd been at all lucid.

Sam saw the hazel focus and felt his heart beat faster.

"Dude, personal s-space." Dean had croaked and Sam had let out a relieved laugh before sinking to the floor and leaning back against the wall next to the dresser.

That was yesterday morning and despite the increasing claustrophobia of having stayed in the same room for over five days, Sam can't stand the thought of leaving.

Because even though Dean's _awake_ and his skin actually looks alive instead of the sickly ghost like pallor of recent days, Sam can't get the image out of his head. Dean lying there, curled into a ball and muttering, mumbling, whispering, and having such strange moments of what can only be a twisted lucidness—_for a lucid Dean wouldn't say anything_—as he told Sammy too much.

Sam can remember it pretty clearly too, and considering he's been up all night ensuring his brother doesn't relapse into whatever the hell he was lapsed into, remembering _anything_ is a feat.

Only, for all intentions and purposes...Dean looks fine. He even says he's fine, and yes, okay, granted coming from Dean that doesn't mean a hellova lot. Considering back in Wisconsin he was haemorrhaging and he only complained to Sam when the interior seats were suffering and the pot holes were unforgiving on his torn and ripped flesh.

But Dean's talking. His voice is a little scratchy but it's nowhere near as weak as the small whispers that should never have been heard of the last few days.

Dean's talking, but he's not _talking._

Sam's tempted to drug his brother up to the eyeballs with pain relief just to get a god damn answer. It's infuriating and relieving at the same time. This is Dean; this fucked up bravado is Dean. His brother thinks silence is golden, feelings stay in not out.

But stripped away as he was, left broken and sniffling beneath the scratchy covers of a motel bed and asking if he could have done more, if he still can...Silence isn't golden. Silence won't quell the insecurities his lowered inhibitions voice out in the open.

Four-year-old legs running fast into the front lawn. Taking care of his little brother, holding his father together. Hunting, fighting, living.

He asks if it's enough—_is it, Sammy? Is it?_—in delirium and Sam can only guess that his older brother is hallucinating. Suffering from visions of their less than perfect childhood.

Worst of all, even worse than a childish mumbling of _Mom?_ is the voice that seems so resigned in its morbid melancholy. _What if we don't find him? What if there's nothing to be found? What if he's gone Sammy? He left me._

_So did you._

And maybe, what's worse again, is the feeling in Sam's stomach that he took advantage of his brother's state to get answers he's longed to hear.

"_Are you scared?"_

"_Always."_

But none of them comforted him as much as he thought they might.

* * *

Sam expected the silence. 

Sam expected it, hell, he's known his brother since forever. He knows him better than anyone, better than their father, or an hunter they've ever come across. He can't remember a time when Dean wasn't _there_ growing up—and California doesn't count, he thinks to himself. It can't, not now.

Sam's not an idiot.

He expected the silence and he embraces it with less-than-open arms.

* * *

When the television turns to static and the weather stops the picture from getting through. When Sam's laptop is away in his bag and he isn't in the mood for music. When he's sitting on the edge of his own bed that he's barely slept in and looks over to Dean he sees a far-off look in his brother's usually attentive gaze. 

"You couldn't have done anything, Dean." Sam says without thinking. Without clarifying, because really he could mean anything. Everything.

"Hmm?"

"You were four."

"Excuse me?" Dean asks, looking up, eyebrows half frowning and half quirked in clouded amusement.

"Nothing." Sam falters, thinking it isn't really fair to have the advantage of knowing so much more when he knows Dean's already starting to sway on the bed.

"Riiiight," Dean mutters before putting the pen in his mouth and turning the pages of the local newspaper.

Sam doesn't point out that it's nearly a week old. Dean will work it out soon enough. He'll notice when he needs to.

* * *

"I'm starving." Sam says, unable to ignore his rumbling stomach any longer. It's way past lunchtime after all, but Dean seems unperturbed about how loose his jeans are. He makes this pinched face whenever he sips at his now-lukewarm water, and Sam knows it has nothing to do with the temperature. 

Sam had ordered take-out once their food had run out, but he'd been a little preoccupied with his brother's jutting cheekbones through skin stretched and translucent and oh god.

_Stop it._

He'd been too distracted to even eat the now fairly old pizza.

* * *

Dean doesn't look up when Sam leaves the room. He doesn't watch his little brother place the pill bottle on the table but he hears it. Hears Sam's little explanation, his nudge that says Dean should take one as soon as he feels a headache coming on. 

"I won't be long," Sam tells him. _I'm not a kid_, Dean thinks and bites his lip against the retort.

He dreamt last night. A lot. Or maybe they were nightmares. He isn't sure. He wasn't stuck onboard a plane crashing to the ground and he wasn't being chased by his mistakes and regrets, or demons for that matter.

He was just _hot_. Burning, tossing and turning and Sam's voice so distant and unreachable and he panics, he panics he—

He wakes up then, blinking at his brother, slumped across the end of the bed, nearly falling completely out of the damn chair. Sam had been watching Dean again, checking his breathing, making sure he was even alive and Dean hates being treated like glass.

"I won't be far or anything and I've got my cell—"

"Just go already, Sam."

He wonders what he must have said, locked inside his own burning skin. He wonders what his feverish stupor let slip to make Sam so damn nervous.

He won't ask. He won't break the silence. Not when he's clearly said enough.

* * *

Coming back from a particularly small store, Sam herds the simple groceries onto the table. Their father's journal is open on the bed and Dean's flicking through each page like he's trying to make up for lost time. The pages are stiff and old beneath his fingers, but the book Dean revealed to Sam in his feverish stupor, is closed. 

Sam ruffles the bag a few hundred times and Dean still hasn't looked up. Dean, who's barely eaten in days, Dean the eating machine, won't take his eyes off the page.

"We'll find him." Sam says softly, finally, having heard Dean's inner fears spoken three days ago. Spoken aloud for everyone to hear; and now with no memory of any such vulnerability as far as Sam can tell.

"I know, Sammy," Dean replies, without looking up, but his fingers still for just a second and grip the leather a little tighter. "I know."

* * *

"Did you know you were ill?" Sam can't help but ask when the clouds outside are building up with rain and the outside chill isn't worth braving to go check out the local library. 

"Sort of." Dean mutters, continuing with his practically monosyllabic replies.

"Sort of?" Sam sounds a little incredulous.

"I felt a little off, that's all."

Sam stops. He pushes the image of his writhing brother out his mind. He tries not to listen to the whimpering and begging. The change between hot and cold and burning and freezing. He tells himself to stow it, _don't start, just be glad the idiot's okay now_...but...

"_A little off_? Five days, Dean! Five days you were out of it, completely. That's not a little off that's a _lot _off."

"Sam, come on—"

"You can barely stand now, three days later and—don't eat that!" Sam growls, as Dean's hand strays to the old—make that very old—take-out on the bedside table. "Eat the good stuff that isn't growing its own stash of penicillin damn it."

Surprised as he is by Sam's outburst, Dean grins to reassure his little brother.

"I'm okay, Sam." His words are quiet. They're not said with an accompanying laugh, they're simple but vital, only Sam isn't convinced.

"Bull, I'm not an idiot, Dean."

"Dude, quit being such a—"

"No! Whatever you're gonna say, just don't, okay? If you hadn't guilt tripped me out of taking you to the hospital you'd have been fine and awake and damn lucid days earlier. We don't even know if it was the flu, what the hell is wrong with you? Ordering me to keep you here, hiding the damn insurance card, who the hell does that?"

"We stay here, we stay safe, okay? You know I prefer to ride stuff like this out, Sam."

"Yeah, and usually you're up in bed bitching and getting me to wait on you hand and foot, but you weren't Dean. You could barely breathe, macho piece of crap—"

"Sam..."

Dean stands, wavers only slightly and smiles, eyebrow cocked, despite the insults his brother is muttering under his breath.

"And now you won't even talk to me? I spent days wondering if you'll even open your eyes and you get to pull this on me?"

"Sammy..."

"Don't Sammy me, _Dean_."

"Then quit treating me like glass!" Dean's eyes narrow until they're almost slits. His outburst is the loudest his voice has been in days and Sam stands back, stops a little.

"I'm fine, Sam. But you're kinda grating on my nerves here."

"I'm grating on _your_ nerves?"

"Yes, Sam, the careful conversation and the oh-so-subtle-spoon-feeding meds. Grating on my _nerves_."

"Well I'm sorry if I don't want a repeat performance of the sniffling machine!"

"Hey, I don't _sniffle_."

His response is spoken so seriously that it comes out as nothing short of comical. Sam's own anger dissipates fast and he grins at Dean, who returns the gesture.

"Really, man, I'm good."

The youngest Winchester wonders if Dean can tell the truth when his fever's gone and the only evidence of his nearly coughing up a lung is the sore throat that takes the edge of his sometimes angry tone.

He wonders about what he heard his brother sigh without really knowing. He wonders about the quiet conversations they had, and the ones he's tried to have since.

He wonders and stares at Dean, less pale, less ill, less lifeless and shivering.

"Yeah well, you better be."

**_-Finished_**

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